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Baloncesto Superior Nacional
The Baloncesto Superior Nacional or BSN (lit. "National Superior Basketball") is the main Puerto Rican men's basketball league. It currently has 10 teams, but has had many teams in several cities of the island. The league was established in 1929. It has produced players that have distinguished themselves in the NBA, European Leagues, and other leagues. Also most of the players in the Puerto Rico men's national basketball team are playing in the league. For the 2011 season, which began the 31st of May,http://bsnpr.com/noticias/detalles.asp?r=4895 each team will play 30 games in a single table format. The regular season is followed by a Playoff with the best 8 teams divided in two groups based on regular season standings (1 vs 8, 4 vs 5, 2 vs 7, and 3 vs 6). The teams will play series the best of seven. The season concludes with the finals, here two teams compete in the best of seven games. The Vaqueros de Bayamón are the current leaders in all time championships with fourteen. The Atléticos de San Germán have thirteen and the Leones de Ponce have twelve. History The league began in 1930, and is noted for having had several head coaches who went on to achieve international recognition later in their careers. Among these are Basketball Hall of Fame members Tex Winter, who coached the Ponce Lions in the early 1950s, Red Holzman, who also coached Ponce in the 1960s, and Phil Jackson, who coached Quebradillas and Isabela in the late 1980s. Others include Lou Rossini, Del Harris, P.J. Carlessimo, Bernie Bickerstaff and Herb Brown. During the 1980s, notable players followed in the footsteps of players such as Juan "Pachin" Vicens (Named Greatest Basketball Player in the World at the Basketball World Championship, held in Santiago, Chile, 1959) and Butch Lee, the first Puerto Rican and BSN player to enter the NBA. Among those are Mario 'Quijote' Morales, Raymond Dalmau, Jose 'Piculin' Ortiz, Ramón Rivas, Jerome Mincy, Georgie Torres, Angelo Cruz, Angel Santiago, the late Federico 'Fico' Lopez and Rubén Rodríguez showcased their talents to all of Puerto Rico's TV viewers and game goers. Throughout the years, the best Puerto Rican players of the BSN have been selected to participate in Puerto Rico's national team. 2008-present Prior to the inauguration of the 2008 season, Henry Neumann resigned as president and entered politics. Felix "Felo" Rivera, then owner of the Criollos de Caguas, was selected to succeed him. Rivera debuted as president on September 22, 2007, when he presided over a meeting with most of the league's staff and other members of the sports community in Puerto Rico. The meeting extended to ten hours and served primarily as a ceremony to officially present him as the BSN president. Several changes to the league's rules were discussed, with two being adopted. The first one being a 50% penalty to franchises with payrolls larger than the $500,000 cap. This had been approved before in 2004 and only Santurce and Ponce failed to stay under the salary cap, however it was abandoned following the conclusion of that season. The main difference was that, with the new rule, the money that the league received with the penalty would be awarded to teams that didn't go over the cap. The second rule approved was that restrictions on second "reinforcement" players were dropped, noting that the quality of immigrant players was supposed to rise. In the meeting, the league announced that the 2008 tournament would begin on March 1, 2008, earlier than in previous years. When September concluded, Miguel Laborde was replaced by Juan Trinidad as the BSN's tournament director. Championships Complete list of BSN Championship winners Number of championships won by teams League all-time Leaders Points Rebounds Assists See also * Puerto Rico national basketball team References External links * Official site Category:National Superior Basketball Category:Sports leagues in Puerto Rico